Murder by Candlelight

by John Stockmyer

  "Though it'll be a little crowded, we'll all fit," Jamie commented, indicating the chairs. "I think I want Susan near one corner, catty-cornered from me. June on Susan's left. Rachel to Susan's, right. Mr. Zapolska ..." still playing the game of "first acquaintance," thank God! ..." between Rachel and me."

  All locating their assigned seats except Rachel -- Susan and June guiding her to her place -- with some scraping back of chairs and hunching them forward, they all got seated.

  Finally settled, each chair uncomfortable in its own way, the arrangement was: Jamie near one corner, Z at a right angle to Jamie's left (so close he could smell her dark perfume.) Susan, was clear across the table -- not that anyone was very far away, the other two packed in to Z's left and Jamie's right.

  "In some seances, it's customary, as I think I said, to have everyone holding hands. This is generally done to keep someone from putting up his hand at the wrong time and feeling a wire that's been lowered into position overhead, a wire that a 'ghost' will eventually slide down. Or to prevent a person from feeling under the table, thereby discovering a lever that, when pulled, makes the 'ghost' groan." Jamie looked at the others meaningfully. "I'm not going to have you do that. But when the time comes, I will ask you to put your hands before you on the table, palms down. Just to rest your hands lightly on the tabletop."

  "There are two reasons for this 'hands on the table' position. First, it's a posture that helps you relax. Secondly, since everyone can see everybody else's hands, it's a guarantee that no one's cheating.

  "Of course," Jamie continued with a smile, "mediums have gone so far as to make flexible, rubber hands. Hollow, of course, so that hot water can be put into them to keep them as warm as human flesh. In the dark, it's impossible to tell if you're holding a real hand or one of the phonies. During a carefully staged, dramatic moment, the medium slips her hand away from the person holding it, immediately substituting the rubber hand in place of her own. This frees the spiritualist's hand to work her 'magic.'

  "It only pays to make elaborate props if you have the opportunity to bilk people out of a substantial sum, however. Which is not the case here." Her smile became a grin. "Anyway, everything that's been done so far has happened in full light. The table setup. Chairs brought in. While I have on a dress with sleeves, they're tight as you can see. Nothing up them."

  Everyone chuckled.

  "Now for the big surprise." Jamie put on her "mysterious" look. "Even though it's customary to operate in the dark, I'm not going to ask Susan to turn the lights out." Speaking to Susan: "I did notice you have your dining room light on a rheostat." Susan nodded, completely taken in. "If we could turn the lights out in here, and soften the light coming in from the dining room, that would be perfect.

  "Again, what will take place," Jamie continued, addressing everyone, "could happen in full light. It's just that softer illumination will help us to concentrate more fully."

  Wanting nothing so much as to be cooperative, Susan slid her chair back, got up and went into the dining room to turn on the light there. Strode back to the living room to switch off the mylar-shaded table lamps. Trekked back to the dining room to begin dimming the ceiling fixture.

  "Perfect," Jamie said -- sooner than Z would have thought, Jamie allowing a stronger light than he'd figured. Expecting tricks, he'd imagined Jamie would have wanted a lower light level than she did.

  Susan came back to the table, sitting down, drawing in her chair to join the compact group.

  "Will you all put your hands on the table now," Jamie said soothingly. "Palms down. Just rest them there. The point is to relax."

  First brushing back her short blond hair, Jamie put her own hands before her, palms down, to demonstrate what she wanted, everyone doing as she asked, putting their hands on the table's scuffed leatherette.

  Z couldn't help but notice that his hands were twice as big as anyone else's, making him feel like Gulliver among the little people: more out of place than usual.

  "Next, make your minds a blank." A cinch for boozy Rachel, Z thought. Though it was also fair to say that June had contributed nothing of an intellectual nature.

  Bright as Susan was, Z wondered how Jamie's razzle-dazzle could have taken her in; at the same time, hoped Susan wasn't sharp enough to see through this farce.

  "Try to sense a foreign presence," Jamie said. Whatever that meant. "What you're attempting is that feeling we all get sometimes, that someone 's watching us."

  Again, a pause. And total quiet.

  It was a little spooky sitting there in the half-light, no one moving, no one making a sound.

  Just part of the effect, Z figured. Nothing like being in a strange situation to make you jumpy.

  If Z tried, he could hear sounds that weren't there. Just a matter of concentration. Anyway, there was no such thing as complete quiet; if for no other reason than the sound of your blood singing past your ears.

  Now that Z was paying attention, he even imagined he could feel ... a vibration ... in the table. As unlikely as it was, "sensed" the table ... shift.

  It was then that the table began to rise, along with it, the hair on the back of Z's neck! At first, only a hint of elevation. Two legs. Then four, the table floating in the air at least a foot off the floor.

  Quickly glancing across at June and Susan, Z could see shock on their faces.

  Fear.

  Not that table levitation, in itself, was anything to be afraid of. It was just that, having the table rise, was against ... the laws of nature.

  Without warning, as it had risen, the table began to sink, until all four legs thumped down on the carpeted floor.

  "Something is in the room," Jamie whispered, a bit of wisdom that was hardly a surprise. "Everyone just be still. There's no danger."

  The next thing Z felt was ... pressure ... on his leg. Something creeping up his shin. ... Wiggling.

  Sweating enough for drops to began forming at his hairline, Z tried desperately to think what it might be. Still crawling up his leg, the thing felt ... familiar. It felt like .......

  Jamie's foot.

  The crazy woman had slipped off her shoe and was playing footsie with him under the table! And not just along his lower leg. The girl must be a contortionist to get her foot up there.

  How Jamie could be this "playful" after the table had just risen, he didn't know.

  Jamie Stewart; without a doubt, the greatest mystery in the room.

  The toes retreating, Jamie then said: "That should do it," her voice soft, but echoing in the quiet of the room.

  She sat back in her chair. Took her hands off the tabletop.

  The seance over, the other women lifted their hands from the table, too, looking around as if trying to locate a ghost.

  Jamie nodded to Susan, Susan getting up to switch on the living room lights.

  "That was some ... experience," June said as Susan came back to the table and sat down.

  "Right," Rachel said, sleepily.

  "But ... what ...?"

  "I can't explain it," Jamie said, cutting off Susan's question. "For some reason, poltergeists get a kick out of lifting tables. Their idea of a joke, maybe, whatever they are."

  "So, you're saying, I've got a problem," Susan said, quietly, the "rising table" phenomenon hammering everyone into submission.

  "Yes. But it's not serious."

  "It seems serious to me. I don't want to live in an apartment with a ... spirit. Making noises. Moving things around."

  "And you don't have to. With this kind of presence, you don't need an expert. Though what I'm going to recommend may sound bizarre, if you'll all do as I say, the poltergeist will be gone in an hour's time. And what's better, never be back."

  "I like the sound of that," Susan admitted.

  The other two nodded their agreement.

  If anything, the evening's entertainment had served to sober Rachel. She looked more "with it" -- if not as happy.

  "Here's what we've got to do," Jamie explained, lacin
g her fingers together, elbows on the table. "As I think I said, the poltergeist, while having the power to move around the apartment, is 'living' in one room only. I know that to say 'living,' when referring to a poltergeist, is meaningless. A better word might be existing." Again, the encouraging look. "For what it's worth, none of this makes sense to me, either.

  "What we've discovered, is that the spirit is here," Jamie waving her hands to include the apartment. "Somewhere."

  The women nodded, Z stopping himself when he realized Jamie was getting him to nod.

  Stupid.

  This whole evening was stupid. Pointless.

  Z didn't need this aggravation, particularly now, when all he had to look forward to -- tomorrow and forever -- was "good" Captain Scherer dropping the proverbial brick load on Z's head.

  Z had to admit that Jamie looked good in her black outfit, though. In addition, what she'd done to him under the table had reminded him of the clever tricks that little girl could play. And with Susan right there in the room, too.

  Jamie was as bold as they came, brazen and, though Z didn't want to admit it ... exciting.

  " ... next phase," Jamie was saying, leaning back, her "lady-like" hands folded in her lap, "is find its room. In preparation for this evening, Susan told me there were five rooms in this apartment, and that is why I asked her to get three friends of hers to sit through the seance. Three friends, plus Susan, plus me -- makes five." Z wondered if Jamie thought the "sailor suit" was still so bombed she'd have trouble counting that high.

  "The next part is easy. Each of us goes into a room of the apartment. What we do then, is be quiet."

  Jamie shrugged. "There's no way to be rational about what I'm going to tell you. So, let me just say it and have done with it. What we're trying to do is to "bore" the poltergeist. So that the poltergeist goes 'home.' That is, returns to the room in the house where it 'lives.'

  "This process can take an hour or more, each of us in separate rooms, pretending to be pet rocks." Jamie put on her most engaging smile.

  "If you can go to sleep, so much the better. What will happen is that, by the end of the hour, one of us will sense that the poltergeist is in the room he and she is occupying. This will tell us that's the room the poltergeist has chosen for its 'home.'

  "As for the rest of us, nothing at all will happen. We'll just be getting an hour's worth of relaxation."

  About people being able to "relax," Z had his doubts. On the plus side, what Jamie was asking -- bizarre as it was -- wouldn't put a mental strain on Susan's friends.

  The only uneasiness "haunting" the back of Z's mind, was the remembrance of a certain type of horror movie, the plot always about a number of people trapped in an isolated old house, one of them a lunatic who, one-by-one, is picking off the rest. The others, figuring out there's a murdering maniac on the loose, immediately go off to separate rooms to make it as easy as possible for the killer to do his dastardly work.

  Not that the current situation was identical to horror movies, but ....

  "And when one of us discovers the 'spirit's' home," Jamie was continuing, "I'll know what to do. There are rituals that drive off poltergeists. The trick is to find the room where it's holed up."

  "But couldn't you have just done the ritual in each room?" Susan might have fallen for Jamie's gift of gab, but she was still as shrewd as ever. "Doing that, we wouldn't have had to undergo the seance."

  "A good idea," said Jamie quickly. "And that would have worked if we'd gotten lucky and picked the right room the first time out. It's just that, if we started in the wrong room, there'd be the danger of the poltergeist getting wise to what was going on. Once the spirit is on guard, it's hell to pay to get rid of the little beastie."

  Jamie stopped. Smiled. "I know none of this adds up. But then, poltergeist phenomena itself, is irrational. All I can tell you is that, from the experience of desperate people trying this and trying that, over hundreds -- thousands -- of years, the way I'm doing it ... works. Even if you're still skeptical, what have you got to lose?" Jamie was addressing everyone now. "Nothing but an hour sitting around -- or lying down if you want."

  "Let's do it!" Susan was decisive. One of the things Z liked about her.

  "All that remains, then, is to choose up rooms.

  "I think," Jamie paused to play-act thinking, hand to her mouth, "that you, Susan, should take the bathroom. Can you spend an hour there without getting too tired?" Susan nodded. "The reason I'm suggesting the bathroom is that the odds say that's the room least likely to be the 'home' of the poltergeist. You've suffered enough already. No reason for you to be disturbed, even a little, if I can help it. What I would suggest, Susan, is that you take a long hot bath. While you'll be doing 'something,' taking a soak will relax you like nothing else. In that sense, it's as good as doing nothing. And let me say again, I really don't expect the poltergeist to be 'haunting' the bathroom."

  That settled, Jamie turned to the rest of them. "The bedroom goes to Mr. Zapolska." Followed by polite snickering from Rachel and June, the girls figuring that the bedroom was a familiar place for Z to be. "For some reason," Mr. Zaposka, "you seem to me to be stressed out," Jamie continued, arching an eyebrow, knowingly. "I know all this is more disturbing for some people than for others. The bed in there will give you a chance to stretch out.

  "I think maybe I'll take the kitchen. No reason, really, except that it's one of the room's that left. And how about June for the dining room. That leaves Rachel in here, in the living room.

  "And this is important." Jamie, being stern. "Lights out -- everywhere."

  That order delivered, she relaxed. Grinned. "But before we do anything, we'd better make sure we won't be disturbing Susan for the next hour."

  A comment that broke the tension, bathroom jokes always good for a shy laugh.

  Smiling pleasantly, Jamie looked at the group. "Is that OK with everyone?" everybody nodding -- like a line of cud-chewing cows. Contented. Dumb.

  "Anyone have to go to the bathroom before we start?"

  Rachel raised her hand. No surprise there.

  * * * * *

  By the time they were reassembled in the living room, even Z had dipped into the sandwiches, the strange experiences of the evening making everyone hungry at last.

  The food "disappeared," Jamie was ready to give them their final instructions. "Remember, no one leaves his assigned room for the next hour. Room lights out. Close your door if you have one, but no need to lock it. I'll be the one who keeps time. I can do that because the stove has a lighted clock. Stay put. I can't stress how important that is. Just relax. Even if you're in the poltergeist's room, nothing bad will happen. OK?"

  It was OK.

  "Then let's split!"

  Feeling like he was taking his marching orders from a laughing loon, Z tramped down the hall, when through what passed for a kitchen, turned into the bedroom, and closed the door. (Some, might have thought he shut the door more forcefully than necessary, though it would be going too far to say he slammed it. He never slammed doors, no matter how irritated he'd become!)

  Z snapped on the bedroom table-lamp to reveal Susan's bedroom, a room he had visited on numerous (and always delightful) occasions -- as everybody in the whole damned apartment seemed to know!

  On the other hand, he could have done worse. Actually, the bedroom would have been his first choice, if Jamie had given anyone a choice.

  For half a minute, there was shuffling in the hall outside the bedroom door -- Susan headed for the bathroom, Jamie for the kitchen. Then, as everybody settled down ... quiet.

  Like a good boy, Z switched off the table-lamp, finding that the others had already done the same, no light showing under the bedroom door. At least Z wasn't the only one playing this stupid game.

  Now that he was alone, Z realized he was ... exhausted, first, from fearing that "frolicsome" Jamie might expose his affair with her at any moment. Then having to consider what would happen when nasty Captain Scherer came down on
him because of the radio interview. Talk about men close to death having their entire lives pass before their eyes! Z's wicked ways were rotating around his eyeballs!

  He was ... beat!

  The darkness of the room making it impossible for Z to see, he felt his way to the bed.

  Normally, Z didn't like Susan's bed -- in no way, a reflection on Susan in bed. His complaint was that Susan had a waterbed, that kind of "sleeping system" providing all the comforts of a lifeboat on the North Atlantic.

  No matter. Though the shifty pallet was inherently unstable, tonight, he'd welcome a coroner's steel slab!

  As Z sat on the edge of the rolling mattress to take off his shoes, then stretch out, lying as quietly as he could to get the damned bedding to settle down, he reflected on the evening. Clearly, Jamie had no intention of telling Susan that Jamie and Z had been lovers. Jamie had done what she'd set out to do, however: make Z sweat! The ghost hunter taking her petty revenge, the evening was about over. From Z's point of view, the important thing was that he'd gotten through without damage to his relationship with Susan.

  The bed quieting at last, Z was feeling ... comfortable.

  He'd beaten the Jamie-rap and, with luck, would get out of the radio interview mess -- whenever. What could Scherer do to him, after all? Z hadn't broken any laws. At least, that the captain knew about.

  A plus was that it wasn't difficult to do what Jamie had asked them to do to finish out the evening. Relax.

  Even ... on the waterbed .............

  Z was alert! Awakened by ... what? ... A noise? Not so much a sound, as ... movement in the air.

  There should be no breeze in the bedroom. Not with the door closed. Unless ....

  In the dark, Z strained to hear .....

  Yes, he'd been right. The blower of the complex's central air was off. Not a breath should be stirring in the bedroom.

  Except ....

  Z refused to believe that ghosts were possible! Rejected giving way to his fears! And yet ....

  Though he hadn't felt motion in the room since the slight breeze had aroused him, Z thought he now heard ... whispering sounds. Faint, but definitely there. The rustling of cloth, dragged along the floor.